Hyatt workers mount weeklong strike after 2 years without contract

September 08, 2011|By Michael Oneal | Tribune reporter

Unionized Hyatt hotel workers in Chicago and three other cities launched a weeklong strike Thursday, in an attempt to turn up the heat in a contract battle with the Chicago-based hotel chain that has dragged on for more than two years.

Members of service-workers union Unite Here began picketing at the Hyatt Regency Chicago and the Hyatt Regency McCormick Place Thursday morning, joining workers in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Honolulu.

Since its contract with Hyatt Hotels Corp. expired in August 2009, Unite Here has staged a series of one-day strikes in cities across the nation, including Chicago, protesting the company's outsourcing practices and what workers claim are abusive working conditions.

But the current job action is the first call for a multi-day picket line, reflecting the union's frustration with what Henry Tamarin, the President of UNITE HERE Local 1 in Chicago, claimed was Hyatt's refusal "to budge on these important issues."

A Hyatt spokeswoman accused the union of doing the stonewalling.

"Unite Here has accepted contracts at (rival hotel chains) Hilton, Intercontinental and Starwood that are nearly clones of the Hyatt contract offer in Chicago," she said in an email. "The only reason the union has taken to the streets instead of staying at the bargaining table and securing raises for our hardworking associates here is that they are focused on organizing non-union hotels in other markets. This apparently is just union politics at its worst."

Hyatt, which is controlled by Chicago's wealthy Pritzker family, is, indeed, the last of the major hotel chains to come to terms with Unite Here.

Annemarie Strassel, the spokesperson for Local 1, which represents about 1,000 workers at the two hotels, said the sticking point with Hyatt isn't a proposed wage and benefit package that she acknowledges is similar to the one the union agreed to with the other chains. Rather, the union is seeking changes in work rules at Hyatt, which it claims has the worst record among the major national hotel chains when it comes to working conditions.

Unite Here is demanding, for instance, changes in language that would rein in subcontracting and has asked that a housekeeper's daily schedule be trimmed from cleaning 16 rooms to 15. Housekeepers are also on call to clean more than 10 "checkouts," which take additional time.

"It's not the wages," said Cynthia Hill, 36, a nine-year veteran of the Hyatt McCormick Place housekeeping staff who was recently off work for eight weeks with a back injury suffered on the job. "I'm (striking) because of how we're treated."

Strassel said the union is also fighting for the right to be able to call local strikes in support of Hyatt workers in other cities, reflecting the union's concerns about the company's treatment of workers.

"The health and safety of our associates are our highest priorities, and we are proud of our work environments," the Hyatt spokeswoman said in her email.

The relationship between Hyatt and Unite Here hit a low in July when Park Hyatt Chicago employees turned the hotel's outside heat lamps on as workers picketed nearby, inflaming the standoff. Even so, talks between Hyatt and the union aren't at a complete standstill. Although several attempts to resolve the contract came to naught over the summer, Strassel said a fresh round of discussions are scheduled for later this month.